TBA
Saturday
Starting the day's fooding with lunch at J & J / Jin Jiang Restaurant. Slightly salty, otherwise entirely indifferent food including the xiao long bao and potstickers. The huge glutenous dumpling was particularly disappointing. The entirely average shrimp fried rice was perhaps the best dish. Wandered over to Tea Station down the street for the monthly special-- large almond milk tea! Yum.
Out with Amy and her sister Jen (and the rest of Jen's baby shower group) at the High Rooftop Bar at Hotel Erwin in Venice after. Great place to view the sunset as the day cooled rapidly. Expensive drinks but that's par for the course at hipster places.
Maple Block Meat Co. in Culver City for another fail at finding BBQ in Los Angeles California. Meats smelled intensely of smoke but the flavor was otherwise lacking.
Fatty brisket was gorgeous looking but highly lacking in flavor, and the texture left something to be desired-- overcooked perhaps? The pork ribs looked just as good but again, seasoning was lacking, and the texture was again showing signs of being overcooked-- the wonder texture of properly cooked pork ribs was gone, and it was some strange in-between land between properly cooked pork ribs and the abomination that is the fall-off-the-bone style that I will fully admit, some people prefer-- I'm just not one of them!
Ranch beans had some heat but no other interesting flavor, although to their credit they were marginally better as leftovers. The creamy coleslaw was pretty damned tho (and cheap!)... sad to say it was probably the best item there?
Smoked almonds, biscuits, and desserts were both tempting, but a half-pound of ribs and a half-pound of brisket plus all of a small coleslaw didn't leave me with room for much else. Prime rib might also be worth a try in a future visit, but given how disappointing (especially for the money) this meal was, not exactly excited to return...